Colored Coins and Coinprism takes Bitcoin to a whole new level

[dave111223]

So every colored coin transaction is posted on the blockchain also correct?

I created a test asset and did a few transactions.  When I check the "Color Address: 3AeiQacQEKTYdWTWCxBaoscDn56UW4j1AB" on blockchain.info is shows nothing...

[Peter R]

These asset exchanges are fascinating, but remember that you still have a single point of trust, the issuer.

An interesting future using either Bitcoin Script, Nxt's Automated transactions or Ethereum's contracts is building simple business logic and then issuing shares for a trustless organization.

Obviously not every company can become a trustless organization, but there are some examples where this is perhaps possible.

Imagine a dice site implemented as a turing complete contract (Nxt AE or Ethereum contract), the shares are issued on one of these distributed exchanges (Coloured coins/Nxt AE) are used to raise funds and the issuer is the automated contract. The contract/dice site then runs the game logic over the chain and all profits are dealt out to the shareholders via the trustless company.

I think this is a bright future, we just need to think outside the box.

I've been thinking about trustless companies too.  It's an exciting idea; however, I'm not convinced they are actually possible (but perhaps I am wrong).  Take the dice site for example.  The dice-game algorithm can be codified and trustless, but where does the server code run?  You can't run a website that processes hundreds of bets per second on the Nxt network, right?  Which means that the site runs on a normal server somewhere.  Which means someone has access, no?

The other thing I don't understand is how a Turing-complete contract running on Nxt could pay bitcoins to share holders in a trustless way.  Wouldn't it only be possible to issue Nxt credits in a trustless way if the contract ran on the Nxt network?

I'm not trying to be critical; it would open up lots of possibilities if it were possible.

[Peter R]

So every colored coin transaction is posted on the blockchain also correct?

I created a test asset and did a few transactions.  When I check the "Color Address: 3AeiQacQEKTYdWTWCxBaoscDn56UW4j1AB" on blockchain.info is shows nothing...

Interesting observation.  Blockchain.info doesn't pick up any transactions at my colored coin address for WTK either (33C124f3w4cJNAi3hVjNMhdegUTAcDRzmB).  

If you lookup a transaction where the color was transferred, you'll see that "something" gets sent to an "unknown" address (which is presumable the colored coin address the OP_RETURN metadata) and that the transaction gets mined.  It would be important to verify Coinprism with a method that is independent from Coinprism itself.  




EDIT: The unknown output in the colored coin transactions is the OP_RETURN command where the metadata is written:

[drawingthesun]

Take the dice site for example.  The dice-game algorithm can be codified and trustless, but where does the server code run?  You can't run a website that processes hundreds of bets per second on the Nxt network, right?  Which means that the site runs on a normal server somewhere.  Which means someone has access, no?

You make a very good point. I think we are probably 5 - 10 years away from running a trustless web server/webapp/website.

However in the dice example, all the logic can be on the chain (See Ethereum) and you can either interact with the dice system in a direct way (send coins to the address with an encoded bit declaring the odds you intend to 'roll' at or you can interact through a front end for the trustless contract. There could be hundreds of websites providing a front end to the raw contract.

You have two options, interact with the company directly through the chain sending money and small amounts of data directly to the contract) or trust someones front end to do it for you.

The other thing I don't understand is how a Turing-complete contract running on Nxt could pay bitcoins to share holders in a trustless way.  Wouldn't it only be possible to issue Nxt credits in a trustless way if the contract ran on the Nxt network?

This is a good point too. I am invested in both Nxt and Bitcoin (and soon Ethereum).

The way I see it is this: The contract will be in nxt for a nxt dice site, so you won't be able to use bitcoin as it's not native to the system. (I have heard that it may be possible to make a contract handle alternate currencies, I think Vitalik said one day Ethereum could become a "off the chain" transaction service for bitcoin in a trustless manner.

However, what I am hoping for is that Nxt and Ethereum prove that a turing complete language is a good thing and it then spurs the Bitcoin developers to think about upgrading Script to allow for this.

[ABitNut]

By the way, if there are still worthless tokens left I created an address as well: 1CcGUZuYwy8okr5hZeLkytwwdFsNwpGC9H I have a feeling these coins will be in high demand in the future 

One worthless token (1 WTK) sent to 1CcGUZuYwy8okr5hZeLkytwwdFsNwpGC9H!

Got my worthless token. There are 100 now ;-)

I have a flat fee contract for my facility so for mining my only (added) cost would be buying mining hardware. So I could generate a color coin to collect capital allowing me to buy a miner, then mine coins and use the revenue from mining to back up the colored coins I gave out?

That sounds like a very interesting way to get me started up as a miner. It sounds far too easy actually. What is the catch?

Yes, that is one of the exciting uses for colored coins.  An entrepreneur could raise money to finance the purchase of equipment, and then use the revenue generated from that equipment to pay interest to his bond holders, or dividends to his stock holders (depending on how he sets up the colored coins).

The catch is just that people might not trust an issuer of colored coins enough to actually buy them!  The issuer has to earn investors trust somehow.  Perhaps he could start a thread that describes his ideas with high-quality posts, and then just try to raise a small amount of funds at first.  If he deliver on his promises and his bond holders or stock holders make a good ROI, they might invest more on his next larger project.  Next thing you know, he may be able to attract large amounts of funding.  By this time, it would be unlikely he'd ever want to screw over his investors even if he could get away with it because he'd ruin all his hard work building up his reputation and lose his ability to raise funds in the future (in addition to opening himself up to potential litigation). 

Yeah, that's the catch for standard investments too. Also, though I have a flat fee contract there is some fair use clause in the contract. So I'm not actually going to set up a huge farm here. Just the idea of funding a business like this is very appealing to me. It's probably also very appealing to all the scammers out there, so as always, investor beware!

I might put some miners though

[dave111223]

Is there anyway to track colorcoin transactions via Bitcoind?

For example if you want to setup a bitcoind wallet to handle only a specific coin color asset?

[minorkacologne]

Interesting idea. I'm not sure it it really puts bitcoin to whole new level but good luck developing it!

[2017orso]

@Peter R

respectfully request a rare WTK if some remain...for testing purposes

18fi8sqAkL8JxfAScVK6inv5F1vFw8HCUD

nm created a token, this is interesting.

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very excited about the potential of colored coins.

[M++]

Hello,

like everyone else i'm confuse with coloredcoin but start to really study it, thanks for your website it's look very nice and easy.
few questions :


Can we imagine a multisign wallet for the issuer of coloredcoin ? I guess with a certain form of organisation it's can help to etablish a trust.

Can we imagine make a token for a multisign wallet private key ? (i'm really not sure about this question xD)



Or do their is anypossibility offer with your coloredcoin that's i don't understand ? If think your understand what my point is with the first 2 questions.

[bish5555]

@Peter R

respectfully request a rare WTK if some remain

18fi8sqAkL8JxfAScVK6inv5F1vFw8HCUD

Behold

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkZFuKHXa7w

[yayayo]

The UI sure looks neat.

However I'm not sure how Colored Coins do compare to its multiple competitors like Mastercoin, NXT, Counterparty, Ethereum and so on.

I'm watching it with interest.

ya.ya.yo!

[Peter R]

@Peter R

respectfully request a rare WTK if some remain...for testing purposes

18fi8sqAkL8JxfAScVK6inv5F1vFw8HCUD

nm created a token, this is interesting.

-------------------------------------------

very excited about the potential of colored coins.

One worthless tokens (1 WTK) has been sent to 18fi8sqAkL8JxfAScVK6inv5F1vFw8HCUD!

[Peter R]

Is there anyway to track colorcoin transactions via Bitcoind?

For example if you want to setup a bitcoind wallet to handle only a specific coin color asset?

Bitcoind is not "color aware" but I suppose an add-on could be written to do exactly what you suggested.  The website, http://coloredcoins.org, has a list of the current wallet projects, although I'm not sure if the list is exhaustive. 

[Coinprism]

Is there anyway to track colorcoin transactions via Bitcoind?

For example if you want to setup a bitcoind wallet to handle only a specific coin color asset?

Bitcoind is not "color aware" but I suppose an add-on could be written to do exactly what you suggested.  The website, http://coloredcoins.org, has a list of the current wallet projects, although I'm not sure if the list is exhaustive. 

At the moment, only coinprism is compatible with open assets. We plan to make a tool that act as a layer on top of bitcoind, that can let you use colored coins without having to use a third party.

[Peter R]

The UI sure looks neat.

However I'm not sure how Colored Coins do compare to its multiple competitors like Mastercoin, NXT, Counterparty, Ethereum and so on.

I'm watching it with interest.

ya.ya.yo!

I think what is confusing to many people is that "colored coins" are not a new alt coin.  The coloring technique is a free and open-source way to turn small amounts of bitcoins into IOUs, shares, vouchers, etc.  Colored coins can co-exist alongside regular bitcoins at a particular bitcoin address.  

You can't buy "colored coins" in the general sense.  But any given person can color a very small amount of bitcoins to create a specific instance of a colored coin.  For example, I created 10 worthless tokens (WTK).

The benefit of creating colored coins that exist on-chain is (a) they can be traded for regular bitcoins in a trustless manner using coinjoin, (b) they are secured by the most powerful single purpose computing network ever created (the bitcoin network).  

[Peter R]

Is there anyway to track colorcoin transactions via Bitcoind?

For example if you want to setup a bitcoind wallet to handle only a specific coin color asset?

Bitcoind is not "color aware" but I suppose an add-on could be written to do exactly what you suggested.  The website, http://coloredcoins.org, has a list of the current wallet projects, although I'm not sure if the list is exhaustive. 

At the moment, only coinprism is compatible with open assets. We plan to make a tool that act as a layer on top of bitcoind, that can let you use colored coins without having to use a third party.

Awesome!

Coinprism, if you don't mind me asking, what is your team's business plan?  Obviously, www.coinprism.com was a lot of work and now all bitcoin users can use it for free (not that I'm complaining!).  Is this just something you guys are doing to help bitcoin and because you are interested, or is there some smart way to monetize related services somehow?

[HeliKopterBen]

the obligatory 0.0001 transaction fee is a bit of a pita for playing around with these colored coins,
which are only 0.000006 each

0.0001 BTC is only four and a half cents ($0.045).  The transaction fee is a deterrent from creating a bunch of spam transactions, so it is a very good thing.  

In a practical setting, the value of the "color" transferred should be much larger than the transaction fee.  The fact that only 6 bits actually got sent is not the point.  The point was to transfer ownership of the digital assets.  

It typically costs over $100 to transfer assets such as shares between brokerage accounts--that's at least 2000 times more expensive than transferring shares using open-assets.  

I am still a bit confused about this.  If I transfer 1000 shares of ABC stock, will the underlying bitcoin transferred be 0.000006 or 0.000106 including the transaction fee.  I would think the transaction fee needs to be included.

[Peter R]

the obligatory 0.0001 transaction fee is a bit of a pita for playing around with these colored coins,
which are only 0.000006 each

0.0001 BTC is only four and a half cents ($0.045).  The transaction fee is a deterrent from creating a bunch of spam transactions, so it is a very good thing.  

In a practical setting, the value of the "color" transferred should be much larger than the transaction fee.  The fact that only 6 bits actually got sent is not the point.  The point was to transfer ownership of the digital assets.  

It typically costs over $100 to transfer assets such as shares between brokerage accounts--that's at least 2000 times more expensive than transferring shares using open-assets.  

I am still a bit confused about this.  If I transfer 1000 shares of ABC stock, will the underlying bitcoin transferred be 0.000006 or 0.000106 including the transaction fee.  I would think the transaction fee needs to be included.

Here is an example of a colored coin transaction. 




I think the 6-bit input from 1MdTq is the "colored coin" and the other input is the uncolored bitcoin "fuel" that makes the transaction work.  You see that there are 4 outputs: two 6-bit colored coins, change, and OP_RETURN metadata. 

One of the colored coins got sent to 1CcG, the other was returned as "colored coin change" back to 1MdTq.  Since all colored coins are 6-bits, this required borrowing 6 bits from the uncolored bitcoin fuel.  100 bits was also paid out of the fuel as a transaction fee, and the rest of the uncolored bitcoins were returned to 1MdTq.  The OP_RETURN logs metadata to the blockchain that records the accounting for how the "color" in the input colored coin was split up into the two output colored coins. 

[dexX7]

I was already amazed by the testnet version, so all I can say: gratulations and awesome stuff!

[Ron~Popeil]

@Peter R

respectfully request a rare WTK if some remain...for testing purposes

18fi8sqAkL8JxfAScVK6inv5F1vFw8HCUD

nm created a token, this is interesting.

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very excited about the potential of colored coins.

Dude I can sell you one but they are really really rare so it would cost you.